Former leading New Zealand publisher and bookseller, and widely experienced judge of both the Commonwealth Writers Prize and the Montana New Zealand Book Awards, talks about what he is currently reading, what impresses him and what doesn't, along with chat about the international English language book scene, and links to sites of interest to booklovers.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Sony takes on Apple as it unveils its first tablet PC

BBC 26 April, 2011

Sony has announced its first foray into the popular tablet PC market, unveiling two new devices.

The gadgets will use Google's Android operating system, according to the company's deputy president Kunimasa Suzuki.
Sales of tablet PCs have been booming globally, led by the success of Apple's iPad.
Sony has said it wants to become a leading player in the market.

The success of iPad has seen many consumer electronics companies, like Samsung and HTC, launch their own versions of the tablet PC in an effort to capture a share of the growing market.

According to research firm Gartner, sales of tablet PCs are likely to quadruple in the next four years to almost 294m units.

Sony has indicated that it is aiming to become the second largest player in the segment behind Apple within one year.

However, analysts say that Sony will find it tough to achieve that target.
"They don't have the starting advantage," said Manoj Menon of Frost & Sullivan.
"It is going to become an increasingly crowded market place and given the players, it is a fairly ambitious goal," he added.

1 comment:

It’s not too surprising that Sony is entering the tablet game, but the S2 almost seems doomed before it even launches. The Echo has been laughed at universally, and while two screens have become accepted in gaming, it seems like a concept that will probably never work out in a product such as tablets where you want to surf the Web. Although it is interesting to note that several months ago a drawing similar to the S2 leaked around the Web as a design for a PlayStation related product, so it’s interesting to see that the design was indeed real, it was just the wrong product.